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Show Us Your Car: '38 Alfa Romeo was 'raced to death'

By the time this 1938 Alfa Romeo was discovered, a classic worth saving, it was in a deplorable shape. The car has been raced for 50 years, including its share of accidents, and was found in Argentina, says

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By the time this 1938 Alfa Romeo was discovered, a classic worth saving, it was in a deplorable shape.

The car has been raced for 50 years, including its share of accidents, and was found in Argentina, says its proud owner, Barry Hon of Dana Point, Calif. He had had it for about five years.

It has been "raced until its wheels fell off," says the car restorer, Chris Kidd of Monrovia, Calif. But the problems went deeper. Though it looks like a touring car, this Alfa was born to race.

It's such a rare car that there were few places to go to find out how it had originally appeared. Hon says the detective work took them to Italy to try to scour through the original plans, but many were lost in a fire. Little by little, part by part, the various damaged elements of the car were brought back to life.

The result is a stunning classic, which we found on display at the Concorso Italiano car show in Monterey, Calif., last month. Not only did he have one of the best looking among the hundreds of Italian cars on display at the show, but Hon says it was the oldest as well.